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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25052287">The Habits of Penguins</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/SallyExactly/pseuds/SallyExactly'>SallyExactly</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Timeless (TV 2016)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Coming Home From The War, F/M, Fluff, Not Finale Compliant, to hell with fridging</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 11:01:18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>10,516</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25052287</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/SallyExactly/pseuds/SallyExactly</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Garcia saved his family. But the war scarred him, and he isn't sure how close he should let Iris and Lorena get.</p><p>Surely chaperoning a field trip can't hurt, though. It's just a few hours. What could possibly happen?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Garcia Flynn/Lorena Flynn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Habits of Penguins</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Every time Lorena’s name popped up on his caller ID, he felt a rush of awe and gratitude. She was <em>alive</em>, damn it. She and Iris both, saved from a death that never should have been theirs.</p><p>They hadn’t been able to fix everything. But they’d been able to fix this.</p><p>“Morning,” he greeted her.</p><p>“Unfortunately,” she grumbled. He smiled, picturing her moving around the kitchen, getting breakfasts together while nursing her first cup of coffee and waiting for the caffeine to kick in.</p><p>“What are you doing Friday?” she asked.</p><p>The day after tomorrow: he wracked his brains. “A, uh, normal day, as far as I know. Why?” He paused. Friday. “Isn’t that Iris’s trip to the aquarium?”</p><p>Iris had been excited about it since it was announced, bringing books on the ocean home every time they went to the public library.</p><p>“Well... maybe.”</p><p>“Maybe?”</p><p>“You know that PTA meeting Monday night?”</p><p>“The one neither of us went to because the group is full of snobs? Yes. Why, were they awful again? Do you need, uh, help plotting an elaborate revenge?”</p><p>She snorted. “It’s only the two snobs. Everyone else is lovely... or at least doing their best.”</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>“Sorry to disappoint you.”</p><p>He smirked. She knew him so well.</p><p>“But apparently, several of them got food poisoning from the guacamole… and most of those were supposed to be chaperones. Ms. Halbert is trying to find replacements, or they can’t go.”</p><p>“How many does she still need?”</p><p>“Four.”</p><p>Four chaperones at the last minute when most of the kids in Iris’s class had both parents working, or were being raised by a single parent, wouldn’t be easy to find.</p><p>He didn’t <em>want</em> to do it. The United States government had dropped all remaining charges against him and wiped his record, acknowledging that he’d helped save the world. He even passed the background check necessary to volunteer at Iris’s school.</p><p>But <em>he</em> still knew what he’d done, even the things that had never been recorded in the 21st century. Feigning normalcy was exhausting.</p><p>But what he wanted was irrelevant. He knew how much Iris was looking forward to this. So he only hesitated a second before he said, “There’s nothing that day I can’t move.”</p><p>“I’ll let her know we’re both available.” Relief was audible in Lorena’s voice.</p><p>“I thought I was on the parent/guardian email list,” Garcia added. “Why am I only finding out about this from you?”</p><p>“Well, if I had to guess, it’s because Snob Number One offered to ‘prune’ the email list for Ms. Halbert after there was all that turnover at the semester.”</p><p>Garcia rolled his eyes, though he knew Lorena couldn’t see. “And let me guess, she has strong feelings about traditional gender roles.”</p><p>“If the stinkeye she gave Juan’s dad when he mentioned being a stay-at-home dad was anything to go by… yeah.”</p><p>And this was why neither of them bothered with the PTA, preferring to support Iris and her class in other ways. Speaking of: “Is Iris awake yet?”</p><p>He’d once told Lucy that if he ever saved Lorena and Iris, he would walk away from them. It was just possible that he could have managed to leave Lorena, as long as he ripped out and set fire to what was left of his heart. Or maybe he was completely delusional. Probably he was delusional.</p><p>But, either way. One look into Iris’s big, trusting eyes, and he’d known he couldn’t abandon her like that, not in a million years. Walking away might help assuage his own feelings of guilt, but it would <em>hurt</em> them. And he couldn’t bear to do that. Not when he remembered their bodies. Lorena might have understood— forgiven, no, but understood— but Iris?</p><p>She was just a child. She was <em>his</em> child. He couldn’t let her grow up thinking she was unwanted.</p><p>So, right now, they were in a... holding pattern. He picked Iris up from school on Tuesdays and Thursdays, took her to gymnastics on Tuesdays, ate dinner with her, made sure her homework was done, and made her lunch for the next day. Saturdays she usually spent most of the day with him, and then he would have supper with her and Lorena.</p><p>It was wonderful... and it gave him plenty of time to fall apart when he wasn’t responsible for her, though he didn’t think he was fooling Lorena.</p><p>“I think I hear her,” Lorena said now. “I’ll go check.”</p><p>He heard the sounds of her running up the stairs. Not the same house where— not the same house, thank God. He couldn’t have crossed that threshold again.</p><p>“Iris,” she said.</p><p>Garcia smiled at the grumbly noise that resulted.</p><p>“Iris, your father’s on the phone for you.”</p><p>Iris grabbed the phone. “Hi Dad!”</p><p>Garcia smiled again, but it hurt. He was her father and he would be there for her. But he didn’t deserve her delight every time he called. He didn’t deserve her childlike trust that he was a good person...</p><p>And he knew, one day, she would find out the truth.</p><p>He shook himself out of his dark thoughts. “Good morning, koala bear.” In another year or so Iris would be too old to let him call her that any more. He would enjoy it while he could.</p><p>“Why were you on the phone with Mom?”</p><p>“We were comparing work schedules.” It was technically true, and he didn’t know how much she knew about the potential cancellation of the field trip. He didn’t want to ruin her anticipation by saying the wrong thing.</p><p>He heard her jump out of bed. “Are you picking me up from school tomorrow?”</p><p>“Of course.”</p><p>“Mom’s making spaghetti and meatballs tonight, are you coming for dinner?”</p><p>“I...” He hedged.</p><p>Iris wanted her family all in the same house again. Constantly. And it hurt him, that it couldn’t be that easy. He desperately wished he could give his daughter what she wanted. But at the same time, he wasn’t the same father she remembered, and he couldn’t pretend he was.</p><p>Would it hurt anything? One extra dinner this week with her and Lorena?</p><p>He was on the verge of saying “let me talk to your mother about that” when he remembered what he’d told Lorena: “nothing I can’t move.” If he were clearing Friday, he had some work to do before then.</p><p>“Another day,” he told her, and tried not to feel relieved that logistics prevented him from making the choice. “You gonna do anything special at school today?”</p><p>Iris chattered for a few minutes about the social studies unit they were doing on immigrants in California. After a few minutes, he told her she needed to go eat breakfast and get ready for school, now, and that he would see her tomorrow.</p><p>He could never hang up with her, or Lorena, without feeling afraid. What if this was the last time he heard their voices?</p><p>But he couldn’t let this fear overshadow his time with them. One day, his time with them <em>would</em> run out, even if he improbably lived to be ninety. And when that day came, he didn’t want to have wasted a single moment dreading the future.</p><p>He showered, and was just finishing his own breakfast when his phone lit up again: an incoming video call. He smiled, and took his coffee to the chair reserved for these chats. “I see you managed not to get lost in another library.”</p><p>“I did that <em>one</em> time.”</p><p>“That you told me about.” He returned a smirk for her glare.</p><p>Then Lucy let her mock annoyance slip, and smiled at him. She looked tired, a little sunburned, and absolutely radiant. “How are you?”</p><p>“We’ve talked about this, Doctor World Traveler. Your news comes first. You have more to report.”</p><p>“Well, we’re exhausted,” she admitted. “Or <em>I’m</em> exhausted. Amy just got out of the shower and mentioned something about going out tonight.”</p><p>Words in the background he couldn’t make out, but that and Lucy’s fond look past the camera told him her comment hadn’t gone unnoticed.</p><p>“But, oh my God, <em>Flynn</em>,” Lucy added. “The murals! They’re spectacular in person!”</p><p>He smiled, and enjoyed his coffee, and Lucy’s enthusiasm as she told him about Crete. After everything, the Preston sisters had decided to use some of their inheritance from their mother to travel Europe for a few months. They were putting the war behind them and getting to know each other again— coming, as they did, from two different timelines.</p><p>“Hey Flynn,” Amy called, when Lucy momentarily ran out of steam and stopped to shovel in more coal. Then her wet hair and upside-down forehead loomed at the edge of the screen. “It’s great here.”</p><p>“Yes.” One day, maybe he’d get out that way again himself. “Where are you going next?”</p><p>“We’re crossing the Aegean to Turkey.”</p><p>He resisted the impulse to tell them to be careful. Lucy was equal to any challenge that arose, and Amy was clearly just as indomitable.</p><p>It just felt strange, not to be watching Lucy’s back any more.</p><p>“We’ll spend some time in Istanbul, then head north through Bulgaria.” Lucy gave him a soft little smile, as if she knew what he were thinking.</p><p>“Tell him about the bus driver,” Amy added.</p><p>Lucy flushed pink — perhaps it was just the sun— and unceremoniously pushed her sister out of the frame. “How are Lorena and Iris?”</p><p>“They’re doing... well.” It was so sweet to be able to say that. It would be sweet until his dying day.</p><p>“I’m, uh, chaperoning Iris’s field trip,” he added. “To the aquarium.”</p><p>“That should be interesting.” Lucy was trying not to smirk.</p><p>“Oh, come on, we saved the world, how much trouble can one field trip be?”</p><p>Lucy stopped even trying not to smirk. “I look forward to hearing <em>all</em> about it.”</p><p>He echoed her smirk with one of his own. “So, Lucy, tell me about the bus driver.”</p><p>She rolled her eyes.</p><p>“He fell in love with her!” Amy called from across the room, as Lucy shook her head <em>no</em>. “He sent her flowers!”</p><p>“He did <em>not</em> send me flowers, they were for his mother and he had extra—”</p><p>He laughed as the two of them argued over each other and became incomprehensible. He’d seen Lucy at her worst, or near her worst. To see her now, with her sister, it was...</p><p>It was good.</p><p>“All right, we’d better go,” Lucy said after a moment. “Take care of yourself. Tell Lorena I said hello.”</p><p>“I will.” He smiled again. “Enjoy the Aegean.”</p><p>Lucy’s smirk returned. “Enjoy the field trip, Flynn.”</p><p>#</p><p>School buses were <em>not</em> made for people of his height.</p><p>His knees were jammed into the seat ahead of him, and he felt like Gulliver among the Lilliputians. He wasn’t sitting with his family, either. The chaperones were spaced out among the kids. Lorena was five rows up, and Iris was sitting with her friends at the front. Garcia was across the aisle from two girls who were fighting over braiding hair, and behind a group of boys who were apparently passing gas competitively.</p><p>“You did it last time and you made me look stupid,” the one girl said. “It’s my turn.”</p><p>“Fine.” The other girl turned her back to her friend. “But you better not <em>pull</em>.”</p><p>“I don’t <em>pull</em>.”</p><p>This went on for a minute or two. Then one of the teachers came forward and tapped her on the shoulder. Iris’s teacher was on the other bus; this was the older woman. “Face front please, girls.” She gave Garcia a meaningful look.</p><p>The girls reluctantly turned forward. One of them made a face. “<em>Oh</em> my <em>God</em> it <em>stinks!</em>”</p><p>“He who smelt it, dealt it,” one of the boys said, and his friends cackled like hyenas.</p><p>Garcia checked his watch. How long was the ride, exactly?</p><p>They finally disembarked at the aquarium, the kids spilling across the front plaza like they’d been cooped up for years instead of twenty minutes. He expected them to split up, but apparently the plan was to take everyone through in one enormous group. He caught Lorena’s eye, and they exchanged looks.</p><p>The upside of this was that they weren’t responsible for any particular children. Instead, he found himself walking beside her at the very back of the group, doing a quick headcount as they went inside.</p><p>“Having fun yet?” she asked softly.</p><p>He snorted. But at least Iris was having fun. Even from here, he could see the way her eyes lit up when she saw the giant open water area on the other side of the lobby. And that alone made the entire bus ride worth it.</p><p>He didn’t try to stop himself from casually scoping out the aquarium. Just because the high points were unlikely to harbor the snipers for which he instinctively checked, didn’t make it acceptable to <em>not</em> know his surroundings. And if anything happened...</p><p>He swallowed past the sour feeling in his stomach at the thought of anything happening to Iris here. To any of these kids.</p><p>“It’s all right,” Lorena murmured. Was he that obvious? To her, apparently, he was.</p><p>He did another headcount, just in case.</p><p>They crossed the big bridge into the aquarium proper. Between the water, the echoes from the high ceiling, and the horde of kids, he couldn’t hear the tour guide at the front. He’d suspected it on the bus, but it was obvious Iris was avoiding them— sneaking glances out of the corner of her eye, then looking away if she saw either of them looking. Their girl reaching the age where her parents embarrassed her gave him a little pang. But she was alive to be embarrassed, and that was all that mattered.</p><p>They heard the sea lions before they saw them. Immediately, two of the boys who’d been entertaining themselves with flatulence began to imitate the barking. Their teacher shushed them.</p><p>“Some of our staff meetings sound like that when the brogrammers start going at it,” Lorena muttered.</p><p>He snorted with laughter, then hastily turned it into a cough when the teacher turned her reproachful look on them.</p><p>“Now, who can tell me what these are?”</p><p>“Sea lions!” one girl called.</p><p>“Seals!” another countered.</p><p>“Turtles!” one boy yelled, earning him a stern look from a teacher.</p><p>“How is, uh, work?” he asked quietly, as the tour guide explained differences between sea lions and seals and said something that made the kids giggle.</p><p>She shrugged. “Same as usual.”</p><p>He knew she didn’t always love her job. And having so much of the responsibility for their daughter couldn’t be helping. He wasn’t doing his fair share as a parent... but he couldn’t convince himself that it was good for Iris to spend half her time with him. He hadn’t come out of the war entirely whole. What if Iris saw the darker side of him? What if he had a nightmare, or a flashback, or...</p><p>He made himself breathe. This was the problem. He couldn’t pretend to be the man his wife and daughter remembered, but he didn’t want them to see how badly the war had... hurt him.</p><p>Breathe. Just breathe.</p><p>“You all right?” Lorena murmured, while watching one of the marine biologists feed the sea lions.</p><p>“Fine.”</p><p>She looked towards him enough to give him a mildly reproachful look. She’d never appreciated being BSed, to put it lightly.</p><p>“You still seeing that therapist?”</p><p>“I wouldn’t spend time around Iris if I weren’t.” The response came automatically. He’d seen what happened when people let the aftereffects of war fester. Some people got away clean; some people took a dose of poison that ate at them.</p><p>He definitely hadn’t gotten away clean. None of the team had.</p><p>“The schedule,” he said. “Do you, uh... would it help if I took Iris another evening?”</p><p>“When?”</p><p>He considered. “Wednesday?”</p><p>“I might get lonely, eating by myself three nights in a row.” Her smile was a little teasing.</p><p>“You could join us, if you want.” She enjoyed her nights to herself; sometimes she ran errands and took care of things around the house, but sometimes, when he brought Iris back, they found her in a robe after a bath, enjoying a glass of wine. But she’d be welcome all the same.</p><p>“Would that be all right with you?”</p><p>“Do you think I’d have offered if it weren’t?”</p><p>“In other words, do I think you have a sense of self-preservation?”</p><p>Garcia opened his mouth, then closed it again. He wouldn’t win that one.</p><p>“Let’s ask Iris,” she said. “Tomorrow night.”</p><p>Why wait until— of course. Because Friday night was not one of their evenings together.</p><p>That gave him another little pang. Most of his time with Lorena, these days, was in the company of Iris. And he loved Iris dearly, but he also loved spending time with Lorena, just the two of them.</p><p>“And you still... don’t want to do overnights?”</p><p>“I have a studio apartment.” The answer came readily and easily, and Lorena’s look said she wasn’t buying it at all.</p><p>“I know,” she said. “I’m familiar with your apartment. And with the terms of your lease, which you could get out of very easily. If you wanted.”</p><p>They watched one of the other chaperones scold a boy for leaning his body against the rail such that his feet left the ground. To quiet the nagging feeling at the back of his mind, Garcia did another headcount.</p><p>“We talked about this,” he said finally. “That would be a lot of disruption for her. She’d have to have duplicates of everything in both places...”</p><p>This time, he got the <em>you’re trying my patience</em> look. “Do you think you could respect me enough to talk about the actual problem?” Her tone was quiet, but not soft.</p><p>He exhaled. “Sorry.”</p><p>“What is it? Are you afraid that if you get too close to us, you’ll get hurt again?”</p><p>The pain in Lorena’s voice cut him to the quick. “Not me. You. Both of you.”</p><p>“Why?”</p><p>They’d danced around this before. “Because of what I’ve done. She doesn’t— she doesn’t even know what I’ve done.”</p><p>“<em>I</em> know what you’ve done.”</p><p>It was true, and the memory sickened him. Left unattended for about three minutes, Lorena had managed to find Agent Christopher’s complete file on him, giving him and Agent Christopher both heart attacks for very different reasons.</p><p>He’d never wanted to lie to her. But maybe that would have been better than the painful disillusionment she’d gotten. He still remembered the look of horror and disgust on her face.</p><p>“Are you planning to do it again?” she probed.</p><p>“That’s not <em>funny</em>,” he snapped, then immediately regretted it.</p><p>“<em>Could</em> you even do it again?”</p><p>“I don’t want to talk about this.” He didn’t want to think about it, either. He definitely didn’t want to be on the verge of tears at a damned aquarium, chaperoning his daughter’s field trip.</p><p>“To save the world? To save you?” he whispered after a minute. But making those choices again would break him, and they both knew it.</p><p>The group moved on to another room, and the tightness in his throat eased. He watched from behind, and smiled, as Iris bounced at the sight of the sea otters, her grown-up attitude dissolving into sheer delight.</p><p>“She’s going to ask for a sea otter toy from the gift shop, isn’t she?” Lorena whispered.</p><p>“Probably.” He’d be happy to buy one for her.</p><p>“Did you see that pile of library books she brought home last week?”</p><p>“Yeah, half of them were on marine mammals, right?”</p><p>Lorena nodded. “I guess time will tell if this is just another phase.”</p><p>“Either way, she’s enjoying it, and that’s what counts.”</p><p>“What’s the big deal, they look like giant water rats,” muttered one of the boys. Iris turned around and gave him a look that would have boiled lead, and Garcia felt a swell of pride. That was his girl. He made a mental note to look up ocean documentaries in case she might want to watch one on Saturday.</p><p>“Now, sea otters are our smallest marine mammals,” the tour guide said. “Can you think of another animal they look like?”</p><p>“They kinda look like little seals,” a kid said after a minute.</p><p>The tour guide nodded. “Yep. And because the two look so much alike, for a long time, people thought otters might be in the seal family. But in fact, they’re most closely related to weasels.”</p><p>“How exactly is it that you think you might hurt Iris and I by spending time with us?” Lorena asked, and his good mood vanished.</p><p>“You can’t just take my word for it?” he growled.</p><p>“Nope.”</p><p>He sighed. He didn’t want her to be the kind of person who backed down from a challenge, but right now, it would’ve been easier.</p><p>“I might lose my temper,” he said, haltingly. It was hard to even get the words out. “I might... have a flashback. I might... have a nightmare.”</p><p>“When was the last time you lost your temper—”</p><p>He didn’t have to think about this. “The night I kidnapped Lucy.” Lucy had forgiven him, but he would always feel deep shame at that memory.</p><p>“—with me or Iris,” Lorena finished.</p><p>He had to think hard about that one. “I think I lost my temper with you the first year we were married.”</p><p>“Yes. I’m still here. And you haven’t done it since, which tells me it’s not exactly a habit.”</p><p>He watched Iris watch the otters. “I can’t risk it,” he said finally.</p><p>Lorena looked disappointed, like he’d failed some sort of test. “I get that you spent years fighting to get us back when we were dead,” she said after a minute. “But we’re alive now. And don’t you think we deserve a say in what you do to protect us?”</p><p>Before he could reply, they moved to another room, this one showcasing estuaries. Without any charismatic mammals, the kids weren’t as interested, and Garcia had to gently redirect one who started wandering off. He did another headcount. The tour guide was explaining why estuaries were important for baby fish, but he wasn’t paying much more attention than the kids were. He was thinking about what Lorena had said.</p><p>From there, they went to lunch in the museum’s small cafeteria. There was some kind of mix-up, and the cafeteria was apparently not prepared for their group. By the time he went through the line, they couldn’t offer him a normal adult meal.</p><p>“I have so many questions,” Lorena said, looking at his breaded chicken in the shape of a fish. “Are those chicken nuggets? Or fish nuggets?”</p><p>“Second question,” he said. “Why?” He took a bite. It wasn’t bad, but then, his standard was “better than prison food.”</p><p>“Third question, do you want half of my burger?”</p><p>“You wanna trade that for these?” He held up one of the nuggets, skeptical.</p><p>“Well, they don’t seem to have turned you into anything yet.”</p><p>So they split his nuggets and her burger between them. Garcia glanced at Iris out of reflex; she was fine, laughing as one of her friends held two straws up to her face. The walruses had made an impression, apparently.</p><p>Once, he’d thought that his checking on her like that was a sign he couldn’t move past the trauma of his memories. Maybe that was true. But now he thought of it a little differently. Every time he looked around and saw her safe... it helped.</p><p>“You finish the book?” She’d been engrossed in one when he’d brought Iris home last night.</p><p>She nodded, and looked a little guilty.</p><p>He smiled. He’d occasionally woken up in the early hours to find her side of the bed empty and cold. When he went looking for her, he’d inevitably find her on the couch, still absorbed in a book. “I didn’t want to wake you,” she would always say.</p><p>He’d used to try to bring her a book from every trip he took without her— something she would actually like reading, which was hard in some war zones and nearly impossible in others. He remembered her excitement when Iris had gotten her first children’s library card... just two months before...</p><p><em>It didn’t happen</em>.</p><p>Another voice chimed in in his mental dialogue: Lucy. <em>It happened to you. And that matters</em>.</p><p>He nodded, accepting it, but also choosing not to dwell on it right now.</p><p>“You okay?” Lorena asked softly.</p><p>“For now? Yeah.”</p><p>He took both their trays back when they were finished eating, and returned to sit with Lorena while they waited for everyone else to be done. “I’m glad we both came,” she said.</p><p>He nodded once.</p><p>“I… miss spending time with you,” she added. Then, at his wince: “What?”</p><p>“Lorena, the things I’ve done… I’m not, I’m not a good <em>person</em> any more.”</p><p>“Says the man who dropped everything to chaperone his daughter’s field trip.”</p><p>He opened his mouth, then closed it again. He knew better than to say <em>that’s different</em>.</p><p>“Even though you knew it would be… uncomfortable,” she added.</p><p>He chose the safer line of argument, because his goodness, or lack thereof, was dangerous territory. “Lorena, if it were <em>that</em> painful, I wouldn’t be here.”</p><p>He knew as soon as the words left his mouth that they were a mistake. There were many people in this world he could fool. Lorena was not one of them.</p><p>“You think I’ve forgotten about you coming home so banged up you ended up in the hospital and the priest gave you last rites?” she asked. “And, to be clear, my point isn’t that you got… hurt. My point is that you <em>knew</em> you were hurt, and you still traveled, because you wanted to be with us.”</p><p>“That… was once.” Even as he said it, he realized what a pathetic rebuttal it was.</p><p>And it got him the Look. “Garcia, I love you, but no.”</p><p>He stared at her.</p><p>She noticed. Her expression turned soft and sad.</p><p>“What… I’ve done,” he managed.</p><p>“I hate what you’ve done,” she said. “But I’d be a hypocrite if I said I was sure I wouldn’t do the same to save the world. And our daughter.”</p><p>She looked so haunted by the very idea, and his heart <em>ached</em> for her. For all of this.</p><p>“But I don’t hate <em>you</em>,” she added. I love you. I… didn’t realize this was news to you.”</p><p>He finally managed to clear his throat. “It’s, uh… it’s been a long five years.”</p><p>“All right, everyone!” Ms. Halbert called, before he could come up with a more coherent reply. “Two minute warning! Clean up your spaces, everyone! Leave them better than you found them!”</p><p>He realized, distantly, that they were completely falling down on the job of watching the kids. A squabble over a cookie caught Lorena’s attention. He did a quick headcount, and went to stand by the trash cans to prevent chaos there.</p><p>After lunch, they toured an exhibit on the deep sea. Garcia watched the stingrays undulating gracefully through the water as the tour guide explained about the food web. One of the boys so amused with flatulence reached forward to tug on a zipper pull on the purse of the girl in front of him. Garcia caught his eye. The boy’s eyes widened, and he dropped his hand like the zipper pull was suddenly molten.</p><p>Lorena noticed. “I wish I could bring you to staff meetings,” she murmured. Garcia snorted.</p><p>They moved on to an exhibit that they could hear as soon as they passed through the doors into the cold room. The kids perked up. Penguins were a lot more interesting than hearing about small fish eating smaller fish. They clustered at the rail, jostling for position and leaning over to stare at the ice below.</p><p>Garcia caught one boy by the loop on top of his Spiderman backpack. “You can’t fly,” he said, keeping a firm hold as the boy startled. “Keep both feet on the ground.”</p><p>The kid slid back down to the ground, looking guilty and mutinous.</p><p>“Does anybody notice anything about the penguins here in our exhibit?” the tour guide asked chirpily.</p><p>Silence.</p><p>One of the boys pointed. “That one’s pooping.”</p><p>“Yep! We call penguin excrement guano, just like from all the other birds. Anything else?”</p><p>Pause. “A bunch of them are just, like, standing around,” said a girl with intricate cornrows. “With the babies.”</p><p>“That’s right. Penguins raise their chicks with their mates. Right now, it’s brooding season, so the parents take turns staying with the chicks until they’re old enough to fend for themselves.”</p><p>“Is it true penguins mate for life?” another girl asked. “Like in Happy Feet?”</p><p>The tour guide smiled as if she didn’t get questions about inaccurate portrayals of animals in children’s movies all the time. “It depends on the species, but many do. Great observations. What else do you see?”</p><p>“There are different kinds,” a boy finally said. “That one’s a lot bigger than all the ones around it.”</p><p>The tour guide nodded. “We have several species of penguins here at the aquarium. That big one in the middle is an emperor penguin, and you can see a group of emperor penguins on the far side of the exhibit. The smaller penguins with the white heads and black beaks are called chinstrap penguins. And then the smallest birds, the ones with the black heads, those are Adélie penguins. Adélies are feisty.”</p><p>“Don’t stand so close to the railing,” Garcia warned that same boy, whose feet were barely on the ground as he leaned on the railing. The boy gave him a sulky, mutinous look, but shuffled back two steps.</p><p>“Now, what are some things you know about penguins?” the tour guide asked.</p><p>Iris’s hand shot up.</p><p>“Mm-hmm,” the tour guide said encouragingly.</p><p>“They’re nearly all found in the Southern Hemisphere, but not just where it’s cold, though that’s where most people think of them. Most of ‘em have white fronts and black backs. None of them fly but they all swim <em>super</em> well—”</p><p>“You are <em>so weird</em>,” one of her classmates muttered audibly.</p><p>Garcia’s eyes narrowed.</p><p>Iris rounded on him, crossed her arms over her chest, and rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah, <em>knowing things</em>, how weird. Stupidity is, like, <em>so</em> in right now.”</p><p>Garcia felt a great swell of pride at Iris’s snark.</p><p>Iris’s teacher bit back a smile. “Kids, we’re here to learn, let’s remember that and show off our very best manners.”</p><p>The tour guide smiled as if she hadn’t heard. If you worked that job— or she was probably a volunteer— you probably pretended not to hear a lot of things. “Who can tell me what penguins eat?”</p><p>“Fish,” a girl with glasses said sulkily, in a tone of <em>duh</em>.</p><p>“That’s right! Penguins eat lots of different kinds of fish. What else?”</p><p>Pause. “Braaaaaains,” said a towheaded little boy, and his friends giggled.</p><p>“Gavin,” the teacher said warningly, and beckoned him aside.</p><p>“Some penguins also eat a lot of jellyfish,” the tour guide said. “We didn’t know that until—”</p><p>A shriek. <em>Splash!</em></p><p>Garcia knew immediately what had happened. He shoved his guilt over not watching more carefully back until he had the luxury of paying attention to it. In two steps he was at the rail; he swung himself over, then let go.</p><p>It wasn’t a long drop. Penguins couldn’t fly; they didn’t need high walls to keep them enclosed. He landed hard on the ice, slipped, and fell to one knee. The angry squawks and screeches in the background came closer. He looked around for the boy—</p><p>Oh, Christ, in the water. Garcia lay flat on the ice and stretched out his arms, straining to reach. He inched forward— if the ice crumbled beneath him—</p><p>The shouts from above intensified, too. The kid was frantically, clumsily treading water. It probably wasn’t deep— but it was <em>cold. </em>Garcia managed to catch hold of his jacket and tug him closer, then his backpack. Then he hauled the boy bodily out of the water.</p><p>“You okay?” he managed, once they were both on solid ice. The boy’s eyes were wide, and he didn’t respond. Shock, or—</p><p>They had bigger problems.</p><p>Garcia scrambled to his feet and lifted the kid up as the penguins pressed closer, advancing with wings spread, determined to drive these strange intruders away from their chicks. He risked a glance over his shoulder, backed up against the wall, and boosted the boy until he could sit, then stand on Garcia’s shoulders. Two adults, leaning over the railing, grabbed the boy under the arms and lifted him up, up— and to safety. Good.</p><p>Instinct made him dodge, and a beak jabbed at where his leg had just been. He tried to retreat to his right, against the wall, to get away from their nests, but they crowded in, trying to drive him into the water. The next beak connected, and he swore, feeling the sharp bite right through the fabric of his trousers. He tried to swat the closest one away, and yanked his hand back right before he lost a finger.</p><p>He could defend himself, but he drew the fucking <em>line</em> at hurting captive penguins in front of his daughter and her classmates. Especially when they were just trying to protect their chicks— he could sympathize. If he could just— <em>ah! </em>Christ, if they knocked him off his feet—</p><p>Something flew over his head and smacked on the ice. The chorus of penguin fury didn’t waver. Then another silvery object, and another, and the fringes of the angry— <em>fuck!</em>— crowd rippled, the ones in the back turning to look at the fish.</p><p>Then something clonked him on the head. What? His reflexive hand touched… rope. A net?</p><p>“Grab hold!” Lorena’s voice.</p><p>He glanced up at her, nearly losing his balance as a heavy penguin body slammed into his legs. She was holding a bucket, flinging fish across the ice. It was two of the other parents holding the net. There was no way they’d be able to lift—</p><p>Lorena handed off her bucket to the tallest kid, and leaned over the railing. “Grab hold,” she repeated, voice steely, and he did, out of instinct more than anything else.</p><p>Their eyes met. He was more concerned for her watching than for him, and that was probably—</p><p>The first tug lifted him six inches off the ground. Just in time, too— a beak came perilously close to where his crotch had just been, and instead struck hard in his thigh. He dangled there for a minute, only slightly less vulnerable to the penguins, the net cutting harshly into his hands. He heard Lorena: “Three! Two! One! Pull!” He jerked up another six inches or so, and then slowly ascended, his feet scrabbling against the wall behind him for purchase.</p><p>And then his head bumped the railing. He let go of the net with one hand, grabbed the railing, and turned around. When he pulled himself up to the top, Lorena was there to steady him as he tumbled ungracefully over the other side. “I’m fine,” he managed.</p><p>“Right, <em>only</em> bleeding from half a dozen places is what you think qualifies as fine.”</p><p>“Where’s the kid?”</p><p>Lorena nodded to the other side of the tangle of people, where he saw a nurse, one of the teachers, and, through a forest of legs, the little boy. He seemed to be trying to wriggle away from all the attention, so he had to be mostly okay.</p><p>More aquarium employees arrived, at various pitches of worry about the penguins, their unexpected visitors, or the facility’s liability. The museum nurse turned to Garcia.</p><p>“Penguins don’t have, uh, rabies, do they?” Garcia asked, trying to lighten the mood.</p><p>The nurse ignored that. “Let me take you back and get you patched up,” he said, examining the blood critically. “And maybe we can find some other pants for you.”</p><p>When he was done, Lorena was waiting on the bench by the door to the staff section of the aquarium. She smiled when she saw him. The hallway was quiet.</p><p>He dropped down beside her. “Where’re the others?”</p><p>“Ms. Dwyer took Felix, the little boy, to the hospital, just to be safe and get him checked out. Everyone else is continuing with the tour, plus four additional aquarium employees. I don’t know if they’re more concerned we’ll break something or sue them.”</p><p>Garcia snorted. “And Iris?”</p><p>“With the others. I told her I was just going to make sure you didn’t get lost.” Lorena looked him up and down. “Nice pants.”</p><p>Garcia rolled his eyes. An employee had volunteered clean sweatpants from his locker, and Garcia was grateful to put on something that wasn’t splotched with guano. But the pants were a good six inches short. He looked ridiculous.</p><p>Lorena put her arm around his shoulders, and he was grateful to slouch down and lean into her for a moment. “Where’d you get the net?”</p><p>“The exhibit on overfishing.”</p><p>Of course. She was resourceful. “Thanks.”</p><p>He felt her shrug. “Someone’s gotta look after you, since you won’t.” Her tone managed to be both serious and teasing.</p><p>He sighed. “I figured the kids’d been traumatized enough for one day.”</p><p>“Are you kidding? This is the most excitement they’ve ever had on a field trip. You just boosted Iris’s popularity into the stratosphere. I heard one of her friends telling her what a badass her dad was.”</p><p>He snorted. Her hand gently rubbed his shoulder.</p><p>Finally he straightened up. “I guess we should catch up.”</p><p>“Are you all right to go back with the others?”</p><p>“Do I look, uh, dangerous?” he said drily.</p><p>Her Look told him she knew <em>exactly</em> what he was doing, trying to deflect from what she’d really meant, and that she wasn’t amused. “It was more important to you that the kids not see you hurt any animals than that you made it out… okay.”</p><p>“And that <em>surprises</em> you?”</p><p>This time, he got the <em>on thin fucking ice, Garcia</em> look. “No. And it doesn’t appear to surprise you. So how is it that you somehow think you’re so awful, you’re dangerous for our daughter to be around? For me to be around?”</p><p>Footsteps saved him from answering. As always, his instinct was to get between Lorena and any trouble— but it wasn’t trouble. It was Iris.</p><p>“Did you run off from the group?” Lorena asked, doing a bad job of looking stern.</p><p>“You didn’t come back,” she said accusingly. “I wanted to make sure Dad was okay.”</p><p>“I’m fine,” Garcia promised her. “A towel and dry pants, and I’m good as new.”</p><p>“You were <em>awesome</em>,” Iris told him. “Like a superhero!”</p><p>This praise hit flesh tenderized by guilt. But then Iris burst into tears.</p><p>“Hey, hey,” he said, scooting over so she could sit down beside him. “Iris, it’s all right. I’m fine. Your classmate will be fine.” He put his arm around her and tucked her against his side, feeling for a handkerchief that he didn’t have.</p><p>“It’s okay,” he whispered, as she continued to cry. “It’s okay. Everything’s all right now.”</p><p>“I was afraid I was gonna watch you get eaten by penguins.” Iris’s voice was muffled by her hands.</p><p>She was too upset for him to smile at that. “Penguins don’t eat people, honey. I was safe.”</p><p>She sniffled. He carefully unzipped her backpack, found her tissues, and tucked one in her hand. “Besides, the people at the aquarium wouldn’t let me get eaten by penguins,” he added. “They would’ve come out and shooed the penguins away if I’d still been down there.”</p><p>Hopefully she wouldn’t think too hard about the mechanics of shooing away a three foot tall bird, but he was pretty confident the employees would’ve taken <em>some</em> kind of action.</p><p>Iris sniffled again. “Someone’s gonna see me— crying,” she said, with all the solemn dignity of a ten-year-old.</p><p>Garcia put the whole pack of tissues beside her. “Your mother and I have both been known to cry, on occasion.”</p><p>“That’s <em>different</em>,” Iris said, and Garcia didn’t smile until she was no longer looking.</p><p>“Don’t worry,” he said. “There’s no one here to see.”</p><p>“And I’m keeping watch,” Lorena said seriously. “Your secret’s safe with us.”</p><p>Still, Iris insisted on stopping at the restroom to carefully wash her face so no one could tell she’d been crying. Lorena and Garcia waited outside, leaning against the wall in a companionable silence.</p><p>“She’s been in there a while, hasn’t she?” he asked after a few minutes. “Should you check on her?”</p><p>Lorena’s look was soft and amused at the same time. “It takes time to get the red out of your eyes, Garcia. She’s anxious for her dignity.”</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>She continued to study him. “How can you still say you don’t deserve this?” she asked gently. With all the hard edges gone from the question, it was more devastating than ever.</p><p>He looked down, touching his tongue to his top lip. “I, uhh…”</p><p>“You want to be with us. And we miss you. Is this anything other than punishment?”</p><p>He closed his eyes.</p><p>She made a soft noise. “I swear, sometimes you’re more Catholic than I am.”</p><p>He snorted.</p><p>“Do you trust me?” she asked.</p><p>His gaze snapped up to her, and he answered reflexively: “With my life.”</p><p>“Then trust me when I tell you you deserve to live it,” she said.</p><p>He stared at her, surprised by this completely unexpected angle.</p><p>It was a long moment later when an approaching staff member broke the silence. “Everything okay?” he asked, rather chirpily.</p><p>“Yes,” Garcia said, still staring at Lorena.</p><p>“I’m glad to hear it,” the employee said. “Sir, I’m gonna need you to put your shoes on.”</p><p>Garcia looked down at him. “My shoes are wet from fishing a child out of your penguin exhibit.”</p><p>“I’m aware, but it’s a health department requirement.”</p><p>Garcia considered pushing it. But they’d found him dry pants, so he decided not to be an ass, and let the employee cover his own.</p><p>Iris came out of the bathroom, acting like nothing had happened and she’d just spent five minutes fixing her hair. But when they caught up with the group at the coral reef exhibit, she stuck with him and Lorena instead of rejoining her friends. When she even chose to sit with him on the bus ride back to school, Garcia was touched; there could be no clearer demonstration of “my parents aren’t completely hopeless, I guess” than that.</p><p>“Hey,” she said, as they were getting off the bus. “I’m glad you came.” Before he could respond, she darted unceremoniously off to the friend who was waving urgently at her, leaving Garcia smiling in her wake.</p><p>#</p><p>Garcia took a deep breath, and knocked on the door.</p><p>Running footsteps, then a pause, something he couldn’t catch, and the door flew open. “Dad! What are you doing here? Mom! Dad’s here,” Iris called, without waiting for a reply. “You’re staying for dinner, right?” she added, stepping back from the doorway.</p><p>“Yes,” he said. “I’m staying for dinner.” He tugged his shoes off.</p><p>“Wait, why do you have a duffel bag?”</p><p>He self-consciously fidgeted with the strap, then dropped it on the foyer floor. “I’m, ah, also staying overnight.”</p><p>She squealed and ran off to the kitchen. “Mom! Dad’s here for a sleepover!”</p><p>Her transparent delight at having both her parents under one roof for the night hurt his heart. God, it seemed like every way he could turn was fraught with the possibility of hurting her, and hurting Lorena.</p><p>But he had to try. He owed it to both of them.</p><p>And maybe… maybe he owed it to himself.</p><p>He started for the kitchen with the plastic container that was his contribution to the meal. He had to force himself not to turn back and check the front door. He knew it was locked and dead bolted. He knew. Besides, it wasn’t like a door like that would stop a determined attacker. It would be up to him to protect them, like he—</p><p><em>Stop. Stop. Stop</em>. He forced himself to take a deep breath in, then out. He studied the pattern of the tile, and made himself notice that it was cool under his feet. He took another deep breath and smelled dinner in the oven.</p><p>He exhaled, and followed Iris into the kitchen.</p><p>Lorena looked up from putting frozen rolls on a baking dish, and smiled at him. “Hello, Garcia.”</p><p>He smiled back instinctively, feeling his shoulders drop. “Hi.” It came out a little husky.</p><p>He transferred the salad he’d brought to a serving bowl, and set the table with Iris’s help. He remembered these dishes. Remembered using them through years of ordinary family dinners. Now they were doing that again, but between those years and this moment was… a dark chasm.</p><p>He shook himself out of it. They were just dishes. He’d used them before, sharing meals with Lorena and Iris, here in this house. He could do this.</p><p>Lorena pulled the ziti and the rolls out of the oven, and they sat down. Lorena murmured grace while Garcia stared at the table and tried not to feel out of place. He wasn’t really sure what kind of speaking terms he and God were on, these days. The last few years had been… complicated.</p><p>Iris started in before Garcia had taken three bites: “Can I get a cell phone?”</p><p>Lorena and Garcia exchanged looks. “You have a cell phone,” she said.</p><p>“I have a cell phone for <em>babies</em>. I can only call 911 and you guys! It doesn’t do anything fun like games.”</p><p>“You have my old phone for games,” Lorena pointed out.</p><p>“It doesn’t have any data! I can’t even call anyone or look anything up.”</p><p>“It’s not worth it right now,” Garcia said. “There’s a lot of ways you can get in trouble with a smartphone— and I don’t mean your fault,” he added, as Iris opened her mouth indignantly.</p><p>“We’ve talked about this before,” Lorena added. “Your dad and I still feel you should wait until you’re thirteen.”</p><p>“But I’m <em>ten!</em> I’m way more grownup than I was last year! And thirteen is forever from now!”</p><p>Garcia stifled a smile as he chewed. He didn’t want Iris to think he was laughing at her wanting a phone. He was smiling because she was ten. Because she’d lived to be way more grownup than she was last year.</p><p>“All my friends make fun of me because I don’t have a phone,” Iris muttered.</p><p>Lorena raised an eyebrow. “<em>All</em> your friends? Miri makes fun of you?”</p><p>“Well… no.”</p><p>“What about Justin? I don’t think I’ve seen him with a phone.”</p><p>“Some kids at school make fun of me because I don’t have a phone,” she corrected herself sulkily.</p><p>“Maybe if they make fun of you for something so silly, their opinions aren’t very important,” Garcia suggested.</p><p>Iris shot him a flatly disbelieving look.</p><p>“We can talk about it again when you’re a little older,” Lorena said, “but for now, the phone you have is fine.”</p><p>“<em>Fiiiiiiiiiine</em>,” Iris sighed, and stabbed her pasta moodily.</p><p>Lorena glanced up and caught Garcia’s eye, and her mouth quirked into a tiny smile that warmed him.</p><p>Iris didn’t sulk for long. As Lorena dished up ice cream with peaches, she helped Garcia clear the table, and was back to chattering away as they ate dessert. Just to be sitting here like this, with them…</p><p>The incongruity between what was and what had been rose up and threatened to choke him. His spoon slipped from his hand and clattered against the bowl. Lorena looked up fast, with a worried expression he hated. He forced some words out and escaped to the back deck, where it was quiet and cool and dark.</p><p>He slumped against the wall of the house. God, Iris had looked so confused. He’d messed up their nice evening. What if— what if he’d had a flashback, or…</p><p><em>But you didn’t</em>, came a voice that sounded remarkably like Lucy Preston, and he snorted.</p><p>The sooner he went back inside, the sooner their evening could get back to normal. But pretending to be fine wasn’t the way forward, either.</p><p>The door opened. “Dad?”</p><p>He swallowed past the lump in his throat. “Yes.”</p><p>“Are you, like, okay?”</p><p>He opened to his mouth to say yes, and choked on the word. Instead, he chose not to lie to his daughter: “I will be.”</p><p>She took a step closer. “What… happened? Are you, like, sick?” She plopped down in the chair across from him, looking worried.</p><p>He took a deep breath in, then out. He looked up at her. “During the years I remember differently from you and Mom.” They’d had to tell her about that. He wasn’t <em>that</em> good of an actor, and… and messing that up would have been bad.</p><p>He’d lost those years with her, learning them only through photos and stories and mementoes. That would always hurt. But she was alive, and that was enough.</p><p>“Some… things happened.” He swallowed. “Some bad things happened.”</p><p>“Oh, that. Yeah, I know.”</p><p><em>Oh God</em>. He felt the adrenaline rush of a threat. “You do?”</p><p>“I heard Lucy and Rufus talking once.”</p><p>He swallowed. “What… did they say?”</p><p>“Rufus said something about going back to normal, and Lucy said ‘after the things we’ve had to do to survive,’ and then they saw me and Rufus started talking loudly about Star Wars.”</p><p>He smiled despite himself. “Is that all you heard?”</p><p>She sighed. “Yeah, Dad, that’s all I heard,” she said, in the tone of one humoring her unreasonable parent.</p><p>“All right.” He got to his feet. “We should… go inside. Our ice cream’s gonna melt.”</p><p>“I already finished mine,” she said, her tone implying that he should’ve understood her priorities better.</p><p>He smiled.</p><p>“And yours,” she added.</p><p>“That’s all right.” He opened the door so she could go ahead of him.</p><p>“Just kidding. Mom put it in the freezer.”</p><p>Lorena was clearing the table. Garcia took over, carrying the rest to the kitchen. She followed him, and looked at him. “You all right?” she asked softly.</p><p>“I’m all right,” he assured her. “Now.” <em>For now</em>. He knew she would catch the nuance.</p><p>Iris sat down at the kitchen bar and chatted away while he did the dishes. He was lucky. In a few years she’d probably want much less to do with him and Lorena.</p><p>No matter how turbulent Iris’s adolescence was, he was so very lucky.</p><p>“And then we did this experiment where we put rocks in water and saw how much ran over the edge into the big container and then measured it, but Tommy and Arjo just, liked, chucked the rocks in there and got water <em>everywhere</em>, and so they couldn’t figure it out, and Miss Halbert got mad.”</p><p>“Ah. Archimedes.” Garcia let the water drain out of the sink and cleaned the basin. “Legend has it that he figured out displacement while sitting in the bath, and when the idea came to him, he jumped out and ran through the streets yelling about it.”</p><p>“That’s not true, Dad,” Iris said patiently.</p><p>“I said it was a legend.”</p><p>She rolled her eyes, smiling a little. “What are we doing tomorrow?”</p><p>“What do you wanna do tomorrow?” he said. “How much homework do you have?”</p><p>“Barely any,” she sighed. “Can we go to the roller rink again?”</p><p>“If you want.” She looked so excited, and he smiled. He knew he risked spoiling her, wanting her to have whatever she wanted… as long as it was reasonable. But there were worse things.</p><p>Iris spent a while showing him funny cat videos, then bounced off to play a computer game. This was about the time Garcia would normally head home… but he wasn’t doing that, tonight.</p><p>“I put clean sheets on the spare room bed,” Lorena said, coming into the kitchen.</p><p>“I could’ve done that.” He felt self-conscious about being here at all. Disrupting their routine was worse.</p><p>“It wasn’t exactly laborious,” she pointed out with a smile.</p><p>He cleared his throat. “So, ah… what do you normally do on Friday night?”</p><p>She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “Want to do something really wild and crazy and help me fold the laundry?”</p><p>Lorena put some quiet music on in the background, and they got through a basket and a half before Iris bounced downstairs in her pajamas. “I got ready for bed!” she announced.</p><p>“Good,” Lorena said. “It’s past your bedtime.”</p><p>Iris pouted. Then she looked at Garcia. “Are you still gonna be here tomorrow?”</p><p>“I’ll be here in the morning,” he promised.</p><p>Her face lit up. She hugged him, then Lorena. “Night Dad. Night Mom!”</p><p>“Night,” they echoed, Lorena kissing her forehead, Garcia smoothing her hair back. He didn’t have to reach down as far as he’d used to. Iris was growing fast.</p><p>“We did something right,” he said softly, listening to Iris run up the stairs and into her bedroom. He would never be the same, but Iris had reached double digit years, and she was growing up happy and healthy. That was worth it.</p><p>“We did a lot of things right,” Lorena said, with satisfaction. Then she took out her phone and set a fifteen minute timer.</p><p>“What’s that?”</p><p>“So I remember to go tell her to get off her school tablet and actually go to sleep.”</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>“Though she’s been getting better about it lately, I’ll give her that. She’s actually been in bed nearly every night this week.”</p><p>They started in on the remaining basket and a half. “I’m… sorry,” he said haltingly. “That I’ve left you to do so much of the parenting alone.”</p><p>She sighed. “I understand.”</p><p>“I know you do. But I’m going to… to try to do a little better.” He’d looked over the terms of his lease, this afternoon, before he’d driven back to the aquarium to return some overly goodhearted employee’s freshly washed and dried sweatpants. “Thanks for, uh, letting me stay tonight.”</p><p>“You’re welcome here any time. You know that, right?”</p><p>He hesitated, and nodded once. Knew, yes. Accepted… not yet.</p><p>The timer went off as they finished the basket. “Do you mind if I check on her?” he asked.</p><p>“Of course not.”</p><p>“I wasn’t sure if this was… part of her bedtime routine. With you.”</p><p>“Not a part I can’t do without,” Lorena said dryly.</p><p>So Garcia went quietly up the stairs, in case Iris was already sleeping. He eased open the door—</p><p>Iris’s quiet shriek startled him. <em>Danger</em>—</p><p>No. No danger. Just his ten-year-old daughter diving into bed. He made himself take a deep breath, which had the additional advantage of making him seem inscrutable and parental.</p><p>“You <em>scared</em> me,” Iris said accusingly, tinged with guilt.</p><p>He considered her reaction. Considered the tablet still glowing on her desk, and what Lorena had said. Considered the squeaky stair, third from the bottom, that he had reflexively avoided since discovering it his first trip to this house. “What were you reading?” he asked finally.</p><p>She visibly debated denying everything. “A mystery from the library,” she finally admitted sulkily.</p><p>“You’ll need a good night’s sleep if we’re going to the roller rink tomorrow.”</p><p>She grumbled.</p><p>“Do you think you can stay in bed, or shall I, uh, remove the temptation?”</p><p>“I’m going to sleep now,” she said with dignity, and rolled over so her back was to the door.</p><p>He smiled. “Good night, dear,” he whispered, and shut the door quietly.</p><p>He found Lorena in the kitchen. “You look… amused,” she said.</p><p>As she poured a glass of wine for each of them, he explained. Lorena sighed, her smile wry. “I should’ve known. She has the library’s ebook app on that thing. I really should pay closer attention to how quickly she’s going through what she checks out.”</p><p>“Do you have to approve what she takes out?”</p><p>“Not if it’s from the children’s section. But she’s outgrowing that fast. She’s more and more into YA these days.”</p><p>“That’s something I can help keep an eye on even when I’m not here,” Garcia offered.</p><p>The relief that flickered across Lorena’s expression told him more than she ever would about how she felt overwhelmed. He pushed his guilt aside for later.</p><p>“Do you have a library card?” she asked. “Never mind, that’s a ridiculous question. I forgot who I was talking to.”</p><p>He smiled, and they sipped their wine in a companionable silence. It was… better, tonight, than the first time he’d ever come here. He could notice the difference. Less time dwelling on guilt and terror; more time enjoying the company of Lorena and Iris. More time in reverence of the miracle.</p><p>The guilt and terror would return, of course. They always did. But right now he was with the woman he loved, and their daughter— hopefully— slept upstairs, and that took precedence.</p><p>They finished their wine, and he washed the glasses and set them gently on the drying rack. “I think I’m going to bed.”</p><p>She stifled a yawn and nodded. “Good idea. I’m going to read for a few minutes first and do the same.”</p><p>He raised his eyebrows. “Should I set a timer to come back down here and remind you to go to bed?” he teased.</p><p>She gave him an affectionate look. “Good <em>night</em>, Garcia.” She hesitated. “I enjoyed all the time I… spent with you, today.”</p><p>He cleared his throat. “Me, too.”</p><p>He got ready for bed and crawled under the clean-smelling covers, leaving the door cracked. This would be the hardest. Going to sleep under the same roof as the two of them, just like the night when…</p><p>But instead, it just felt right. Like he was where he belonged.</p><p>He heard Lorena come quietly up the stairs and move around in her room, and then he was asleep.</p><p>#</p><p>Garcia turned under the covers, felt something tug at them and keep them from turning with him, and came fully awake.</p><p>On the other side of the bed, Lorena was asleep on top of the covers, curled towards him.</p><p>He now vaguely remembered feeling the bed dip in the middle of the night. But his mind, maybe subconsciously recognizing her, had known there was no threat, and he’d fallen back asleep.</p><p>She stirred, and her eyelids flickered. She grumbled. Then her eyes snapped fully open. “Sorry,” she whispered, cheeks red. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep here.”</p><p>What if he’d had a flashback? Or a nightmare?</p><p>But he hadn’t. “It’s all right.”</p><p>“I just woke up, and…” she yawned, then continued, voice still rough with sleep. “The house felt… quiet.”</p><p>He knew her well enough to hear what she wasn’t saying. She’d come in here because she was lonely. Because once upon a time she’d shared this house with a version of him… and then he’d left her. With good intentions, but he’d still left her.</p><p>His heart ached. He’d done this to her.</p><p>He swallowed. He’d made all these noble resolutions about taking on more of his fair share of parenting Iris. And he would keep them. But he’d forgotten to tend an equally important relationship: he wasn’t just Iris’s father, and he wasn’t just Lorena’s co-parent.</p><p>He wasn’t sure what he was to her, exactly. Their marriage was only on paper, nowadays. But he loved her.</p><p>“What do you need, Lorena?” It slipped out more easily than he had expected.</p><p>Her turn to look confused. “Nothing. I’m going to go shower—”</p><p>“No,” he said gently. “What do you <em>need?</em>”</p><p>She looked at him, and he knew she understood. He also knew that something had instinctively sprung to mind, for her, and she wasn’t telling him.</p><p>And he knew her. He wriggled out from under the covers, and patted the coverlet beside him.</p><p>She sighed softly, and slid over until he could put his arms around her.</p><p>She relaxed against him, and her soft little noise, half needy, half contentment, cut him to the quick. “I miss cuddling,” she murmured.</p><p>He wanted to tell her he was sorry. Instead, he just let her enjoy the moment. Her need pulled his head out of his own troubles, and he focused on the way she still fit in his arms just right after all these years, the warm weight of her… the smell of her hair.</p><p>Gently, he stroked from the crown of her head and down her back, then back up, rubbing slow circles over her shoulder blades. She rested her face against his chest. His emotions were going haywire, and he was glad she couldn’t see him blinking water out of his eyes. But this was for her, and that knowledge let him leave all the turmoil aside, and just lie here with her.</p><p>“Consider this an open invitation,” she whispered.</p><p>“To… cuddle?”</p><p>“To have this bedroom,” she murmured. “Whenever you want.”</p><p>He took a deep breath. Thinking of that…</p><p>“I don’t want to pressure you,” she added, and looked up at him. “You know what you need. But… I miss you.”</p><p>He swallowed, and gently stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “I miss you desperately,” he whispered, hoping she wouldn’t hear, knowing they were too close for her not to hear.</p><p>He missed them desperately— but what if…</p><p>But nothing bad had happened last night, and several good things had. “It would be… nice, to do this again,” he said finally.</p><p>She smiled, and tucked her cheek against his sweatshirt.</p><p>Finally, she murmured, “Thank you, Garcia.”</p><p>“Of course.” He didn’t make any move to pull away until she did. “Of course, Lorena.”</p><p>She moved vaguely in the direction of getting up, but he reached down and gently took hold of her wrist. “I’ll make breakfast,” he said. “You go back to sleep for a little while. Pancakes all right?”</p><p>“Iris will be overjoyed.” She snuggled into the covers.</p><p>That she didn’t put up even a token protest told him how spread thin she was… and yet, she wasn’t sleeping through the night. She’d looked after him for so long. It was time for him to pull his head out of his ass and realize there were more important things than his fears.</p><p>“What do you want?”</p><p>“I like pancakes too, Garcia.”</p><p>He smiled a little ruefully, and sat up, pulling the blanket within reach for her. “Do you want anything else? Besides the pancakes.”</p><p>Her eyes closed. “Mmm, I’d love a good fruit salad. There’s some pineapple in there. And grapes, and melon…”</p><p>“All right.” Greatly daring, he leaned down and kissed her cheek. “I’ll call you both when they’re ready.” He hadn’t heard Iris stirring yet. Neither of his girls liked mornings.</p><p>Lorena opened her eyes just far enough to give him a sweet, sleepy smile that nearly stopped his heart. “Yes,” she said. “Let us know when you’re ready for us.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Based on a #FlynnFriday Imagine prompt.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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